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Dessert

Almond Candy

A sweet almond confection made by caramelizing sugar with sliced almonds.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,245 recipes. Both carry 2,3-pentanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Almond Candy

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Butter a skillet well.

Make the candy

  1. Add the sugar to the skillet, then add the sliced almonds.

  2. Stir with a well-buttered spoon as the sugar begins to dissolve.

  3. Continue stirring slowly until the mixture turns light brown.

Set

  1. Pour the mixture onto a buttered platter and spread it with a spoon.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Almond + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

  2. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Almond + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,679 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Sugar
Melts and browns to form the caramel that binds the almonds together.
Sliced almonds
Add nutty flavor and crunch to the finished candy.

The step that matters

Stirring until light brown. Once sugar starts to melt and color, it can go from light brown to burnt quickly. Stirring slowly spreads the heat evenly so the sugar colors without scorching, and the light brown color signals it is ready.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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